Opinion | Features

Enough with the cooking shows already says media trading director Sam Tedesco. The market saturation is not doing anything positive for the ratings.
Like most members of the Australian TV viewing audience, I love a good cooking show. Right now, though, I need a break from high-pressure personality-driven food formats.

In this opinion piece Kevin Fitzsimons argues SBS documentary Go Back to Where You Came From demonstrates how people will accept ideas more readily when they are shown them.
‘People don’t do conceptual,’ was one of the best pieces of advice I received early on in my marketing career.
It took a while for me to grasp the value of the advice and even longer to apply it.

Australia's biggest supermarket is struggling. Steve Jones spoke to industry experts about how Woolworths' marketing strategy has faltered, and whether the brand can revive its fortunes.
When Woolworths chief executive Grant O’Brien fell on his sword last month after another disappointing set of quarterly figures, it surprised no one.
Without a chief marketer following the abrupt dismissal of Tony Phillips – and with several other high profile executives exiting stage left in recent months – it was just another in a long line of senior level departures at the embattled supermarket.

Media commentators not condemning the booing of AFL star Adam Goodes are effectively condoning bullying argues Adam Ferrier.
I have always admired Adam Goodes. Dual Brownlow medallist, premiership player, Australian of the Year, continued good work for indigenous people. He certainly deserves respect. Don’t know if I like him or not though, never met the guy.
However, Alan Jones commented on the issue recently and said the reason Goodes is getting booed is just that, ‘Because they just don’t like the fellow’.
What a damaging thing to say, and surely it’s not as simple as that?

After recently switching to ING Direct Ian Sizer says the current ad campaign for the online bank is seriously making him consider switching back.
When you get an ad appearing every single ad break it can be irritating. Some ads though go way beyond irritating and become so infuriating it can totally bugger up your evening.
That’s what happened to me last weekend when my viewing was interrupted on a regular basis by the latest offering from ING Direct.

While storytelling has become one of adland's biggest buzzwords Rob Lowe argues marketers are failing to make the necessary emotional connections.
I remember first hearing people talk about ‘storytelling’ a few years ago. I never quite understood it then and I still don’t fully understand the term now.
In fact, like many others, I think it’s overused marketing jazz.

Ahead of the launch of Seven's new reality format Restaurant Revolution tonightAngely Grecia crunches the numbers to see what sort of a buzz the show is creating on Twitter.
The Restaurant Revolution - the new foodie reality TV-show that sees ordinary Aussies designing and running their own pop-up restaurant to win a grand prize of $200,000 - is alive and well on social media.

Despite all the hype the news dinosaurs still dominate the plains of online news in Australia argues The New Daily editorial director Bruce Guthrie in an address to the Rural Press Club.
One way or another, as a journalist and editor, I’ve had a front-row seat at the migration of news from print to online over the past 20 years. And whenever I reflect on that sometimes painful, often clumsy process I am reminded of the joke about the man who walks into a bar with a frog sitting on his head.

In this opinion piece Mumbrella's Alex Hayes argues Lexus' new Heartbeat Car stunt will not raise the pulses of ordinary punters.
I have to admit the new 'world first' Lexus 'Heatbeat Car' leaves me cold.
It comes across as technology for technology's sake - they could have achieved the same results with CGI.

In this guest post, Shabaz Hussain wonders what a posh British drink’s surprise social media win at Wimbledon says about sports sponsorship for brands.
According to a recent Brand Intelligence Report from Amobee the brand most associated with The Championships at Wimbledon in 2015 across social and digital is Pimm’s – a traditional cocktail drink that spectators enjoy at the event.
What makes this more interesting is that fact that they were not an official sponsor of The Championships.

With more than $200m of business in play in Australia due to global pitches. But David Angell asks whether swapping partners will achieve much for these multinationals.
Do you watch soap operas? Of course you don’t, you’re all busy executives with crippling workloads.
But I bet most of you can remember them from younger days.

While some of the figures in the latest RECMA rankings are questionable Nic Christensen argues they still provide an interesting insight on the state of the media industry.
There's something about the RECMA numbers that just does not make sense. But when you ask a bunch of agencies to tell you how much they spend every year you're likely to get some very interesting results.
But despite the inconsistencies they are still the best map of media agencyland, are provide insights around the challenges of staff churn, the rise of programmatic and the broader challenge of falling client spend which are actually quite telling.

The way that blogger and influencer outreach is currently being executed is fast becoming unsustainable, and the industry should be worried argues Louisa Claire
When bloggers began sharing the brands they loved and used in their everyday lives, readers found their endorsement authentic and relatable; it came from someone “just like them”. Research found such backing from “real people” was more successful in swaying purchasing decisions than celebrity endorsements, and marketers opened their eyes to a massive opportunity to leverage bloggers’ voices.
The concept of blogger outreach was born.

Australia’s ten shittest branded flash mobs

There’s now little in marketing less inspired than a dance flash mob. Be it in Rundle Mall, Adelaide, Federation Square in Melbourne, Queen Street Mall in Brisbane, Sydney’s Martin Place or a grim suburban strip mall, marketing companies are rinsing gullible clients for dollars on the promise the video will go viral.

And some big names – the likes of BMW, Dell, Qantas, Milo, Domino’s and Wii – are among those turning brand gold to shit.

One look at the grim faces of those who happened to be nearby when the experiential marketing project broke out is all that is needed to understand why this is a marketing trend that is D.E.A.D.

I humbly offer you my top ten shittest Australian branded flash mobs of all time:

The customers couldn't make it

Brand: Game/ Wii

Where: Paramatta Game Store

When: December 2009

The lowdown: The YouTube upload description offers an insight into how they wished it had turned out: “Check out this flashmob… It was insane! The whole store just broke into dance… playing the Wii video game Just Dance.” Yeah, right.

Views: 45,552

Just the reaction they hoped for

Brand/ cause: Qantas new route

Where: Sydney Airport

When: June, 2011

The lowdown: Fair to say that the stunt to publicise the Sydney to Perth route didn’t captivate the crowd, even if the cupcakes that followed did.

Views: 4,847

Unbridled enthusiasm

Brand/ cause: Bondi Pizza opening

Where: Bondi Pizza

When: August, 2011

The lowdown: A roomful of people calculating how long before they can go back to their drinks

Views: 62

The crowd goes wild

Brand/ cause: Climate change awareness

Where: Sydney Opera House

When: July 2009

The lowdown: And who exactly were they making aware of climate change?

Views: 123,407

The audience couldn't make it

Brand/ cause: Australian Services Union/ Fair Pay

Where: Victorian State Parliament

When: May 2011

The lowdown: An excellent example of guerrilla marketing in a vacuum

Views: 1879

Inexplicably, it didn't go viral

Brand/ cause: Dell Streak mobile phone

Where: Circular Quay, Sydney

When: September 2010

The lowdown: If the brand values encapsulate low interest and low production values then this certainly did the job

Views: 792

Pulling a crowd

Brand/ cause: Power Bar

Where: Martin Place, Sydney

When: July 2010

The lowdown: Don’t pick a rainy day to do a flashmob. Otherwise the dancers will outnumber the audience

Views: 1.231

At least she enjoyed it (every time)

Brand/ cause: BMW X3

Where: Sylvania BMW

When: March 2011

The lowdown: Another over-excited YouTube description: “VIP guests at Sylvania BMW’s X3 Launch were taken by surprise when a team of dancers burst into their cocktail party with a rendition from “Grease!” Anyone else suspicious that the video editor has had to replay footage of the same blonde woman laughing uproariously in four different places?

Views: 12.932

Lucikly, a TV camera was on hand

Brand/ cause: Milo

Where: The Gabba, Brisbane

When: November 2010

The lowdown: Choreographed Ashes flash mobs at their least spontaneous

Views: 19,152

The joy of spontaneity

Brand/ cause: Domino’s Pizza

Where: Westfield shopping centre, Brisbane

When: July 2011

The lowdown: In an unfortunate mix up with the word “unoriginal”, in the press release to announce the marketing stunt, Domino’s described it as “unique”.

The temptation to set up a flash mob at next years Mumbrella360 is overwhelming.

Patrick
27 Aug 11
11:52 am

You know you’ve wasted your money when there are more flash mobbers than there are views.

Andrew
27 Aug 11
12:42 pm

The BMW one actually made me feel ill it was so bad.

Mike
27 Aug 11
5:36 pm

Agreed! They are lame, and shame on the agencies and “creatives” who were even more lame to suggest them.
But one important point to make here Tim: this is NOT experiential marketing.
Experiential marketing is at its core, a one to one engagement where the target opts-in to the engagement.

It’s not a show you put on hoping someone will watch. It’s not anything that happens online (the online world is the diametric opposite of experiential marketing). It’s not PR stunts.
“Experiential” gets thrown around a lot these days, and only a very few know how it’s done, and even fewer how to do it well. And an experiential marketer would NEVER recommend a flash mob.

Craig
27 Aug 11
9:27 pm

If it wasn’t for flash mobs there’d be a lot of semi-professional dancers forced to work in the mines for four times as much money.

Not only are they lame, but the really interesting thing here is that they open their clients up to the risk of a hefty legal settlement due to copyright infringements. I’m sure these would be considered an advertisement in a court of law, and I’d doubt very much the production budget extended to paying the tens of thousands of dollars for the music rights.

Thankfully the music industry isn’t very litigious so I think they’ll be alright…

NJ
28 Aug 11
7:21 am

Sickening awful. Especially that union one where they had to sing the song themselves. Great list though!

DeanM
28 Aug 11
9:27 pm

I am unsure if anyone who has commented on any of the above actually attended any of these events or experienced any of these flash mobs? I attended the Bondi Pizza and BMW events and I have to say that the energy at both was brilliant, and the talkability post both events seem to work I thought. 45,000 views for a flash mob of dancers who I hear all voulenteer for the love of dance to me seems like a smart investment for a brand. Ohhh and if any of the above didnt have a flash mob would we not be discussing these brands now???

Thanks, a good list. Some of these agencies/companies seem to have mistaken the flash mob concept for the much older ideas of ‘lame street theatre’ and ‘choreographed performance at corporate event’. The Opera House forecourt is a stock standard performance venue, so you’d hardly be taken aback to find people dancing there in a group. And when you hold the event you’re hardly delighting a group of strangers with a totally left field surprise.

Debbie Downer
29 Aug 11
10:19 am

I love the descriptions on the uploads the best. “Like, OMG everyone just started joining in! Lucky I caught it all on my iPhone…starting from a few minutes before it began…from multiple angles…including security footage…”

I don’t think the medium is dead though. Just that “big group of people suddenly dancing in a public place” flash mob might have been done to death now. You could be a little more creative with it – have a look at what Improv Everywhere do with theirs. Essentially all they are doing is flash mobs, just organised a lot better and do different things besides choreographed dances (which they do as well to be fair).

Slice And Dice
29 Aug 11
10:20 am

I was at The Gabba in Brisbane on the day of the “Flash Mob”…truly woeful. Good post, Tim.

Nice one! I’ve seen flash mob routines where the audience was already lined up before the choreography began… sort of defeats the purpose.

darren
29 Aug 11
11:47 am

Not to mention the public liability issues should one of these “dancers” break something slipping on a disgarded Cheeseburger

Alison_F
29 Aug 11
12:14 pm

Hilarious! Really brightened my day, haha!
I think Australian audiences are easily embarrassed for others and this may have a lot to do with Flash Mobs not taking off here quite like they have overseas…

AdGrunt
29 Aug 11
1:27 pm

Has there ever been a good branded flashmob?

By good, I mean a flashmob which has had some meaningul positive impact on customers and their perceptions; which hasn’t been a scam and relied on busloads of “extras” parked in adjoining streets for when it starts to go lumpy; which has truly used social media to draw spontaneous action and a brand together.

Anyone?

AC
29 Aug 11
1:53 pm

What’s with the swear words, is it really necessary? I mean you talk about ruining a brand, have you thought about Mumbrella’s name and what you’re making it look like with your potty words?

Jasmine
29 Aug 11
1:55 pm

I happen to be in that “Shit” first flashmob at GAME and it was one of the most fun moments I have ever had, and YES I do have a life. The ratio of spontaneous dancers to organised dancers were outnumbered. And hey, the video got 45,552 views. Ain’t too bad i’ll say. Sales went through the roof of Just Dance that afternoon.

Whatever, let’s get on with it… I bet the person that wrote this is one of those people that stands in a corner at a party while everyone else is having fun dancing!

mumbrella
29 Aug 11
2:04 pm

Hi Jasmine,

I’m a little curious how you know what the sales were if you just happened to be in the store at the time?

But in the meantime, congratulations on following brand style and referring to the store as GAME rather than Game. Not many unaffiliated consumers would know to do that. You must be a very committed customer indeed.

Bondi Pizza at 1 minute and 1 second. A spitting image of Michael from Masterchef busted checking out some girl – mind you I would have been averting my eyes from the cringe worthy “flash mob”. Amazing.
These are a brilliant list and I’ve been squirming at my desk trying to watch them… thanks Tim. Last weekend I saw on my facebook news feed an ex-colleague posted “holy cr4p – we just did the craziest flash mob. so much fun. thanks girls for the help, you looked amazing. omg. lol etc…’. Two comments up I saw another post from someone else saying ‘just saw the lamest flash mob, I must have been asleep 20 years and now they’re making an ironic comeback’.

Maybe you misunderstood what I wrote. I actually worked for GAME and I was there as part of the official flash mob. And a little defensive I will be. I understand I wrote that in the wrong context, however, I was a dedicated employer and we all had fun at the end of the day. It actually turned out to be a successful campaign for us! But I am not speaking for all flashmob’s. I guess I just like to dance.

Susie
29 Aug 11
2:38 pm

Dave – couldn’t agree more… so so wrong

Kylie Green
29 Aug 11
2:46 pm

There’s even a TV show in the US called ‘Mobbed” that promotes flash mobbing for events such as marriage proposals. I couldn’t think of anything worse.

Ok so let’s drop both “S%#T” and “POTTY” and go with “WORST branded flashmobs”. Anything but swear words when creating blogs please. … particularly those in which you hold the responsibility of mentioning multi-billion dollar corporations’ brand names, all of which I’m sure wouldn’t appreciate their name being next to gutter terminology. Lift it up a little and a great blogger ye shall be!

A
29 Aug 11
3:38 pm

Flash mobs just suck.

Tammy
29 Aug 11
3:39 pm

Bravo Tim.

My highlights?

‘Unbridled enthusiasm’ in Bondi Pizza vid – (1:01secs)
The very inconspicuous entry of two new dancers in ‘Power Shift Sydney” (1:27sec)
Watching to-be flash mobbers almost bursting with excitement in ASU flash mob (34sec)
And ‘What The F%^&? is going on here?’ nose rub in Dominos vid – (1:47)

They have one of these every two minutes in London and the saddest thing is, I think the ‘audiences’ are hired as well. Lets just say they seem to appreciate them very ‘enthusiastically’.

I liken it to a form of marketing rape. You’re not expecting it. There’s no reason for it except to get your attention. It doesn’t deliver a message. And it leaves unsuspecting victims scarred for life. I’m scared to walk anywhere near Covent Garden again.

T-Mobile’s “life’s for sharing” should have been the end of it.

John Grono
29 Aug 11
5:41 pm

Dave (2:23pm). Well there goes my next career move.

utter shite
29 Aug 11
5:56 pm

the sad thing is that in parallel with the advent of “free” media channels such as youtube, facebook, twitter etc there has been an increase in the view of clients that people give a crap about their brands and that they will go out of their way in their busy lives to watch clients effectively masturbate in front of them. unfortunately with no-one watching this stuff they’d have been better spending the money in media actually promoting their brands/products.

PerthWriter
29 Aug 11
5:56 pm

I love this Tim.

Is it even just the slightest bit ironic that this article has increased all their video views?

rob
29 Aug 11
6:01 pm

@ Devil’s advocaat maybe they can call that new style of flash mob a “trash mob” and you just pick a random brand’s store and run in and take stuff and trash the place, then the brand gets promoted all over the media in the news bulletins, which makes it worth their while – that’s real guerilla marketing

steven
29 Aug 11
8:10 pm

Tim can we please out the agencies who created these monstrosities?

CAP
29 Aug 11
10:10 pm

Personally I could not watch these videos and have not. I still found the article interesting and the comments enlightening though. Firstly this is Australia and we like to swear. If you don’t like it AC then fuck off! Secondly you marketing morons are incredibly transparent to anyone with an IQ above room temperature (sadly a relatively small percentage of the population). Ultimately you are only fooling yourselves. Last of all, flash mobs should definitely be banned. No one should ever be subjected to this level of bad tatse. At least morons who watch Andrew Lloyd Webber shows do so voluntarily.

Luke R
30 Aug 11
9:02 am

This article is shitty, it is just a list of videos with the words “this is shit”. Ok, Mumbrella everyone in the world is stupid except for you.

JB
30 Aug 11
10:45 am

Wondering how many other people didn’t get even get the newsletter because it ended up in spam because of the language?

AdGrunt
30 Aug 11
11:42 am

@JB – almost none, as few spam filters use swearing, mild or otherwise.

Unless you work in government…

Flash your.....
30 Aug 11
2:03 pm

keeping the theme alive I suggest we embrace “Gash Mobs” where groups of girls gather in central places like Pitt St mall and take their gear off in the name of a brand needing promoting

Alison_F
30 Aug 11
2:33 pm

@Flash your…. WTF are you talking about??? You seem to have taken a nice, interesting thread and turned it into an embarrassing sexist rant… Good one!

Flash your.....
30 Aug 11
3:39 pm

@Alison_F that was the plan!!

AdGrunt
30 Aug 11
6:12 pm

Apologies for digressing from the main topic, but around the headline’s choice of words, this seems an appropriate contemporary reflection of Australia’s relationship with the vernacular:

It’s so obvious what companies the negative commenters work for (hint: see list of 10 shittiest branded flash mobs)

Karen
31 Aug 11
8:53 am

Love the list, only one word describes these – embarrassing!

SP
31 Aug 11
1:42 pm

Oh dear!!! I wanted them to be fabulous to deploy my cynical attitude towards the out dated notion of Flash Mobs so started with Qantas, then BMW expecting at least a high level of ‘Fun’ – but I ended up clicking stop as I cringed under my desk.
Even though the idea has been done to death it can still capture people & make them smile & even have mileage to get pr and create conversation…..but then I guess chicken pox can do the same thing….except of course, for the smile part.

Make it big, make it bold and spend some coin & most of all make it memorable…that is if you want to do this to your brand….
It’s not experiential marketing, it’s just ‘an event’….

Reuben
31 Aug 11
4:17 pm

Why is *anyone* still talking about flashmobs? Is it 2003?

Original...'yeah right'
1 Sep 11
2:50 pm

Glad someone else saw the Domino’s one and thought it was lame – so much good digital work but an opposing ‘experiential’

It’s extremely rare that you find advertising to be anything more than rehashing someone else’s idea. Funny watching some of these and watching the public just walk past without even looking at the performers,

Mumbrella is bound by the standards of practice of the Australian Press Council. If you believe the standards may have been breached, you may approach Mumbrella itself or contact the council by email at info@presscouncil.org.au or by phone (02) 9261 1930.For further information see www.presscouncil.org.au